Happy Valentine's Day (and some V-day Complaints)!

Disclaimer-- this post is more about venting than dispensing actual advice, but hopefully you'll be able to glean some useful information from it!


Happy Valentine's Day!  I'll be honest with you, I enjoy celebrating Valentine's Day.  I know it's a Hallmark holiday, and is pretty much just an excuse for flower shops and restaurants (and Hallmark, of course) to boost sales, but for whatever reason, I like doing something for it.  Even when I was single, my friend and I established a tradition (that lasted a whole 2 years!) of going out for burgers at some of the city's top spots that we hadn't yet tried.  In case you're wondering, we went to the Burger Joint at Le Parker Meridien one year, and Molly's in Gramercy Park the second.  If you don't have a date, or just want something really low key, I'd definitely recommend going the burger route!

Burger Joint--not a bad-looking V-Day meal!

As good as that burger looks, and as much as I enjoyed our mini-tradition, I enjoy having a legitimate date on Valentine's Day even more (no offense Cass!), and it's a nice excuse to celebrate your relationship.  Because it is a Hallmark holiday (IMO at least), I don't think it's necessary to go completely crazy.  Ideally, I'd like to go to dinner at a cute, reasonable, low-key, exposed brick Italian restaurant in the East Village.  You know--the ones you see on every other block. I figured it would be easy to find one and make a reservation.  I was wrong--most of them are booked up, and are only offering expensive prix fixe menus.  I'm not down with that. I'm a picky eater.  I also don't like being told how many courses I need to get.  I especially don't like this when the restaurant is usually not a pretentious, prix fixe type restaurant.  


And forget about a sceney restaurant!  They get booked up months before, and most of them have very expensive prix-fixe menus.  


Of course, I am generalizing.  There are restaurants that offer their normal menu, you just have to dig a little to find them. Asellina-- the new restaurant at the Gansevoort Park Hotel (for which I have a 9 o'clock reservation that I'm probably going to cancel--so if you want it, let me know!) is one example.  Of course, Asellina is pretty pricey normally, but at least you're not constricted to some overpriced Valentine's Day menu, just an overpriced regular menu.  Another interesting option is Primehouse, which I believe is offering its regular menu as well (also expensive).  However, Primehouse is throwing in a bonus-- free admission to Ten's Gentleman's Club.  Now, if this is something you'd like to do, I have to say it's a pretty good deal!


It's pretty last minute, if you're still considering going out, there are still restaurants with available reservations for tonight, so check out Opentable and make one while you still can!  (Otherwise, my guess for your best bet would be a neighborhood restaurant, but call them and make sure they have openings--I would not just walk in!).  


Anyway, on that positive and romantic note, single or coupled up, enjoy your Valentine's Day and eat lots of chocolates (or wait til tomorrow when they're on sale!).